When Henry David Thoreau abandoned city life, he did so with a purpose. Writing in Walden, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived…I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms…”
And that was before the introduction of cell phones and e-mail accounts.
So, in the modern era, how does one find that Walden experience for ourselves? How do we combine a restorative approach to mind, body, and soul, while at the same time tempering the need for focusing on work, including the power that comes with like-minded souls who can provide a resource for collaborative thought?